Deus Ex Machina
by Sakura Katana
Summary: I am eleven years old when I realize that the world is rotting." Light has never felt completely human. ON HIATUS INDEFINITELY.
1. Zero

**A.N. **_This was inspired by Blueberry-Valentine's fic _Machine_, which is about L. The two fics are parallel right now, but in chapters towards the end it may deviate from that. So you don't have to read _Machine_ to read this, but it's still an awesome fic and you should anyway. Also,_ **please review!**

**Disclaimer: **_Don't own anything. (That includes_ Death Note_.)_

I am zero years old when I think I see an angel. It is my first sensation when I open my eyes. I unwittingly stare directly at a lightbulb, and I have an innate feeling that it is something supernatural. At this point in my life I have barely been exposed to the natural, so how this sensation came about is unknown to me. Still, it is there until I discover that a lightbulb is, in fact, a machine.

It is February 28 when Sachiko Yagami gives birth to me after only two and a half hours in labor. I am aware that the people around me look proud and happy. The doctor congratulates my mother and father, and those I will come to know as my relatives smile and ask my parents what they will name me. I later overhear my grandmother, Hana, asking my uncle, Makoto, why my parents gave me such an unusual name. Makoto shrugs and says that 'Light' is not an easy name to forget.

I am taken home from the hospital at the beginning of March. My parents live on the ninth floor of an apartment building in Tokyo. There is a window near my crib, and I enjoy watching the street through it for a while. As my eyes improve, I realize that the cars come and go in patterns. When my father enters and exits the apartment, it fits into this pattern. The flow of traffic begins to bore me soon after I come to this conclusion.

Fortunately, around this time I start toddling around and my parents begin to talk to me in something other than cooing and baby talk. This is much more interesting than cars and pedestrians. I want to be able to communicate like that as soon as possible. My father, Soichiro, is the first to notice my concentration whenever someone speaks around me. He brags to Makoto the next time he visits our apartment: "See that? Light's trying to learn how to talk."

Makoto is skeptical. "He's a little young, don't you think?"

I am offended by this. I want to respond, but I have not yet mastered the act of speaking. I don't want to try it in front of people until I'm sure I can make myself totally clear.

"What's wrong with being early?" my father asks. He rubs my fuzzy head and says, "I bet you can understand every word we're saying, can't you, Light?"

I'm too young to understand the concept of a rhetorical question. I nod, making both men jump.

"That's amazing!" my father exclaims. "Sachiko's got to see this." With that, he hurries to the kitchen, every inch an excited dad.

Makoto continues to stare at me. "You are one smart kid," he says.

I sense something in his tone that I don't like, even if I'm not sure what it is. People act happier and more carefree around children as small as I am, I have noticed, but Makoto is being very strange. He's looking at me like my father looks at the papers he brings with him when he comes home during the evening surge of traffic. Does he guess that maybe I don't understand _every_ word?

To put my uncle at ease, I turn the corners of my mouth up in a smile. This is an action that adults seem to adore. It even leads to some of them pinching my cheeks, which I abhor. Makoto does not harass me in this way, but he does smile back.

My father reenters the room with my mother in tow. Makoto turns away from me to tell my parents that he has to go. While they say their goodbyes, I close my eyes and pretend to be asleep. As much as I like attention, I'm tired of it now.


	2. Two

I am two years old the first time I tell a lie.

I've stretched the truth before, (such as, "But Mommy, I'm not - _yawn_- tired") but this is my first serious attempt at deception. It fails miserably.

It's a Sunday. My mother is out grocery shopping, and my father is asleep. He's supposed to be watching me, but he was working a case until the early morning and coffee only does so much. He is snoring softly on the couch while I sit quietly beside him, examining a picture book.

I'm trying to match the characters on the page with the words I have in my head from the book being read to me. It is tedious work. I keep suspecting I'm over-thinking the whole thing, then second guessing this suspicion.

Suddenly, an idea strikes me. I remember asking my father a few weeks ago why he wears glasses. He told me that he cannot read without them, and this is a fairly common condition.

If I wear my father's glasses, will I be able to read? There's only one way to find out.

I set my book down and stand up on the couch. Thankfully I'm not wearing shoes (standing on a couch or armchair with shoes on would be breaking one of my mother's rules). I stealthily reach over and remove the glasses from my father's face. I turn them over in my hands, trying to figure out how they work. I notice that the lenses are slightly curved, but can't make any further progress in my deduction.

Carefully, I put the glasses on. What happened next is the result of several mistakes:

_1. I'm too excited about the prospect of being able to read to notice that the glasses are far too large for a toddler._

_2. I set the book down when I stood up._

The latter was stated in a previous paragraph and may not seem like a mistake, but since it ultimately led to:

_3. When I bend over to pick up the book, I don't think to take off the glasses or hold them in place. Being (as I stated in number 1) far too large for my two-year-old head, the glasses slide off my face and onto the floor._

Because this room has a wood floor instead of tatami mats, the right lens cracks slightly when it hits the ground. I panic silently. I'm positive that my father will be angry, since I overheard him complaining to my mother about the price of prescription lenses some time ago. Why didn't I think of that before I was so careless?

I am sure that I'm going to get in trouble when my father wakes up if I can't fix his glasses. Staples are out of the question. Could I use tape? No, even clear tape would be too noticeable. Maybe glue, but I don't think our glue is strong enough- wait. There's the super glue in the cabinet. It's strong and nearly invisible when dry.

I am specifically forbidden to use the super glue. My mother has heard several stories about kids who accidentally glued their fingers or lips together, and had to go to the hospital. Even if I was allowed to use the super glue, it's kept on the highest shelf of the bathroom cabinet, which I can't reach without a chair from the kitchen. (I'm not allowed to stand on those even with my shoes off.) But in order to cover up my mistake, I'm going to have to break these rules.

My heart pounding, I tiptoe to the bathroom with glasses in hand and set them on the counter. From the ground, the cabinet's top shelf looks a kilometer high. What if I fall and break my neck? Is this really worth it?

Of course it is. The probability of a fall, especially a potentially deadly one, is extremely low, all things considered. I begin my endeavor to pull a (very, very heavy!) kitchen chair down the hall to the bathroom without making much noise. Luckily for me, it only snags on the carpet twice. I take off my socks and push myself up onto the wooden seat. Even from that height (which seems tremendous to me) I have to stand on my toes to reach the top shelf. And there it is: the super glue. The one thing that can fix my mistake.

I push the chair back to its usual place before beginning the repair. I sit cross-legged on the bathroom floor, focused intently on the tiny gap between the two sections of the lens. This must be how a surgeon feels. I squeeze the tube just enough to get glue in the crack, then carefully press the lens together- it sticks. Hopefully when the glue dries it will be sufficiently transparent.

The last stage of the plan - getting the glasses back on my father's face - goes flawlessly. I return to my picture book, worrying all the while that the pounding of my heart beat will wake my father. Somehow, it doesn't. He dozes for another half hour, then wakes suddenly, reaching for the inside of his jacket. (He isn't wearing one.) He looks around as if for the source of a noise, then realizes he's at home. (As he rises in the ranks of the NPA, he will do this more and more frequently.)

"What is it, Dad?" I ask. I know I won't get a real answer.

He shakes his head. "Nothing."

He gets up and heads toward the kitchen to get a drink. I'm relieved; he hasn't noticed anything irregular about the glasses. I allow myself to relax - too early.

My father's voice comes from the kitchen. "What the- Light, what happened to my glasses?"

My first thought is to confess, but instead I reply, "Huh?"

"They're cracked," he says, walking back to the couch and showing the spectacles to me. The super glue has not rendered the crack invisible. "And they look like they've been repaired with glue. You wouldn't know anything about this, would you?"

His tone isn't angry... but I'm still scared. I shake my head. "I don't think so."

My father looks a little surprised, then takes a seat beside me on the couch. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure."

"Light."

"Yes, Dad?" I look up at him with my innocent expression. It's reserved for relatives and my mother when she wants me to take a bath, but this is a special case.

"When I fell asleep, this crack wasn't there. You're the only one in the house. Even if the glasses had been broken by some accident, they couldn't have just glued themselves back together, could they?"

"No..." I can't look at him. I know I've been found out, and some sort of punishment is inevitable.

Instead, my father messes up my hair and says, "You did a pretty good job with the glue."

"I did?"

"Is this super glue?"

"No."

Now my father looks more serious. After a few moments he says, "I can't figure out why your first impulse is to lie to me. Light, this is obviously super glue. How did you even get this?"

Since he is clearly distressed at this point, I don't even attempt deception. "I stood on a chair. I know I'm not supposed to. I didn't think you would find out."

My father sighs. "Light, it doesn't matter whether the other person would find out or not. Telling the truth is always the best thing to do. You should have just woken me up and told me what happened."

I nod. "Okay." But always telling the truth... I'm not so sure about that.

He smiles at me, looking relieved. "What were you doing with my glasses anyway?"

"I thought they would make me be able to read." I show him the picture book I've been concentrating on.

"R- really?" he looks more shocked about this than about his broken glasses. "But- you can't read, can you?"

"No," I reply, trying to keep the frustration out of my voice. I open the book up to the third page. "But I know this-" I point at the 桃の少年 characters "is the same as here and on the cover, and the name of the book is _Momotaro_, so it must mean 'peach boy', right?"

"Th-that's exactly right," my father says. "You're a regular detective, figuring things out like that."

I'm not paying attention to him; I am remembering the rest of the story, and the rate at which my mother turns the pages when she reads it to me. "So... _Out came a lively baby boy, who they named Momotaro."_

My father nods. "You remember the story?"

I turn the page. There is a picture of an older Momotaro carrying water. "_Momotaro grew up to be a strong boy." _Another page turn, then: "_One day, bad people attacked the village..."_

I pause to glance up at my father. His expression is hard to read. He looks more than surprised- shocked, but not in a bad way, I decide. Still, I don't like not knowing what people are thinking about me. "I don't know any more of it," I tell him. I realize too late that this is yet another lie, but my father doesn't seem to notice.

"That's amazing!" he says. "Light, most kids learn to read in school."

Oh. School is years away.

My father laughs. "Don't be sad about it; learning early is great! It's just not normal, that's all." He messes up my hair again. I hope he doesn't continue to do this with such regularity. "You keep practicing that, okay?"

"Okay," I promise. And I will. Just not in front of people for a while, until I can predict what their reactions will be.

**A.N. **So this took a little longer than I wanted it to, but I think it came out pretty good. Hopefully I will be updating at a faster pace from now on, since midterms are over. Thanks for reading, and **please review** with comments, praise, criticism, suggestions, whatever! All feedback is appreciated!

Oh, and _Momotaro_ is an actual Japanese children's story. I don't own it or DN or anything else.


	3. Three

I am three years old when I discover the benefits of being solitary. This is partly to due to the fact that on June 18, my sister Sayu is born.

For my parents, the birth of my sister is made more momentous by the anxiety it brings along with the joy of having another child. Sayu is premature and cannot yet breath properly. She is hooked up to machines for weeks, and does not come home with our parents for almost two months. Although she would develop into a healthy young woman, for the first year of her life she is very weak, and requires an abnormal amount of attention and care.

I, comfortable in my position as the only child in the house, am used to being the center of attention. Sayu's homecoming coincides with a particularly complicated case at the NPA, so I end up being all but ignored for a period of time. This is confusing for me at first, but I soon realize it can't be helped. My mother is very grateful for my cooperation.

Every day I am asked if I want to go play with the children who live in the apartment next to us on the right. And every day I say no, thank you. I don't say that I have already spent far too much time with Daiki and Miyu Wakahisa.

When Sayu was still in the hospital, I stayed in the Wakahisa family's apartment. Daiki, four years old, and Miyu, three years old, were excited to have someone besides their sibling to play with all the time. I was less enthusiastic after I got to know them.

Daiki is the more tolerable of the two, mostly due to the fact that he has several Gundam models that I enjoy taking apart and putting back together. (I would do this while he was at preschool during my stay at their apartment, as he would definitely throw a tantrum if he caught me in the act.) However, when Daiki plays with the models, all he does is "fly" them around and smash them into each other. This is irritating, but still allows me to examine the miniature robots.

Miyu plays with dolls, finger-paints, and sings. I firmly believe that is a complete summary of her existence.

Therefore, I spend my days almost exclusively at home, in my room. I advance my reading ability considerably, but do not show it off or tell anyone about it.

When Sayu is very weak she is also very quiet. She simply does not have the energy or lung capacity to cry. (In fact, the first time Sayu bawls like a healthy baby, my mother also bursts into tears, though hers are of relief.)

At night I lay awake and listen to the silence. I imagine that myself and my bed and the walls and the city and the world are not there. Everything is nothing.

I don't know why I fixate on this, but it fascinates me. As with most things, the allure wears off after a while. But unlike most things, the nothingness that I can't seem to stop imagining does not bore me. It scares me, and more than a few times I have to bite my lower lip to keep from... what? Screaming, crying, laughing, calling for help? I don't know what I would do if I did not stop myself, but I feel the need to hold myself back nevertheless.

Then I realize what the problem is with the nothing that seemed so perfect before. So the next night I imagine that everything is gone but myself.

I lay there in the dark, and am perfectly alone.

This does not scare me.

**A.N. **Yes, I know it's a shortie, but I hope you enjoyed reading it. **Please review** with any comments, suggestions, criticism, praise, and all that jazz. (If you can figure out how to literally reply with jazz I would be impressed. Consider this a challenge... sort of.) ^^

**Disclaimer: **Don't own Death Note, don't own Gundam.


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